SJND News

Patrice Kavanaugh '75 and her husband are deeply involved in volunteer efforts in Ethiopia: "We have made a wonderful connection with a Catholic nun who supervises two Catholic schools in Gimbie, a town of about 35,000 people in western Ethiopia. We have travelled there twice for about five weeks each time. We bring donated laptops to teach the teachers and the students computer skills. We also teach English and my husband (who is handy) fixes stuff! We anticipate returning... read more

Student Artists and Performers Wow in Competitions

2014 has been a big year for SJND’s Visual and Performing Arts program. Students have competed and won awards in national, state and regional band, musical theater and visual art competitions.

Recently, 17 student artists from SJND entered art works into the annual Congressional District Art Competition. Megan de la Resma ’15 won 3rd place in the competition continuing SJND’s legacy of artistic excellence. There were over 80 works of art from students of 16 different high schools in the congressional district. Megan’s thought provoking portrait titled Daydreaming stood out to the judges over many other impressive works of art. In honor of the artists who submitted works, several SJND students attended a reception on May 17 as guests of Congresswoman Barbara Lee at the San Leandro Library. Each artist in attendance had their picture taken with the congresswoman as they received their certificates of participation.

Ms. Lauren Rosi and her cast from In the Heights achieved a new level of success by being nominated as one of the top six high school musicals in the state at the California State Musical Theater Honors Competition. Modeled after Broadway’s Tony Awards, this regional awards competition recognizes outstanding achievement in California’s high school musical theater. Students Ruben Souza ‘16 and Daniela Chaparro ‘14 were nominated for outstanding acting awards and the entire cast was nominated for Outstanding Production. On May 19th the SJND cast headed to San Jose to perform in the final competition.

“Although we did not walk away with any awards, our kids were extraordinary! Ruben gave a flawless and inspiring solo performance as the youngest nominee of the night and Daniela led the whole cast in an energetic and passionate group number that had the crowd cheering and clapping along,” says Ms. Rosi.

One of the highlights of the day was when the cast met Michael Balderrama who served as one of the judges. Balderrama was an original cast member of the Broadway In the Heights production. Mr. Balderrama shared that he was so inspired by the passion of the SJND cast that he was going to head back to NYC to tell his Broadway In The Heights family about our students who made him so proud.